In The Garden Of Iden: The First Company Novel: 1 - Softcover

Baker, Kage

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0765314576 ISBN 13: 9780765314574

Publisher: Tor Trade, 2005

Synopsis

This is the first novel in what has become one of the most popular series in contemporary Science Fiction, now back in print from Tor. In the twenty-fourth century, the Company preserves works of art and extinct forms of life (for profit of course). It recruits orphans from the past, renders them all but immortal, and trains them to serve the Company. One of these is Mendoza the botanist, who is sent to Elizabethan England to collect samples from the garden of Sir Walter Iden. Her quest is jeopardized by Nicholas Harpole, who stirs unfamiliar emotions within her about her future - with a man she will long outlive.

About this title

Review:

In 16th-century Spain no-one is surprised, what with the Spanish Inquisition and all it entailed, if they are carted off to the dungeons on trumped-up charges. What 5-year-old Mendoza, on the brink of being tortured as a Jew, is totally unprepared for is to be rescued by the Company--the ultimate bureaucracy of the 24th century--and made immortal. In return, all she has to do is travel through time on a series of assignments for the Company and collect endangered botanical specimens. The wisecracking, mildly misanthropic Mendoza wants nothing to do with historical humans, but her first assignment is to travel to England in 1553--uncomfortably close to those damn Inquisitors--with Joseph and Nefer, two other Company operatives. Their intent is to gather herb samples from the garden of Sir Walter Iden, a foolish though generous country squire. (Kage Baker knows her Shakespeare: Sir Walter is the descendant of Alexander Iden, loyal subject of Henry IV, who slew the hungry rebel Jack Cade in that very garden in Kent.)

The cyborg trio poses as Doctor Ruy Lopez, his daughter Rosa (the irrepressible Mendoza, now grown) and her duenna, Doña Marguerita; Sir Walter's hospitality and discretion are bought for the promise of restored youth. (There are hilarious moments that call to mind the Coneheads, who claimed to be from France when caught doing anything peculiar.) Sir Walter's secretary, Nicholas Harpole, is immediately suspicious of and hostile towards the strange "Spanish" visitors, which prompts Mendoza to fall in love with him. Nicholas has his own badly kept secret: he's proudly Protestant at a time when Queen Mary and Philip of Spain are on a catholicizing rampage. Mendoza knows Nicholas is probably doomed, and that as a Company operative she cannot meddle with his fate, but love makes people do desperate things. Baker surpasses even Connie Willis in humour and precision of period detail in this fresh, ingenious first novel. --Barrie Trinkle

Review:

Praise for "In the Garden of Iden"Baker's characterizations are robust and detailed, as is her development of the historical setting ... [Readers] will recognize in Baker a fantasist of considerable promise."--"Publishers Weekly
"So, how do you classify a seriously philosophical time-travel story of a young cyborg's first love amid religious conflict? As a good read."--"Locus
"A highly impressive and thoroughly engrossing debut."--"Kirkus Reviews on" In the Garden of Iden "The debut of a major talent. Kage Baker is a fresh, audacious, ambitious new voice." --Gardner Dozois on "In the Garden of Iden" "The prose is compulsively readable - it has the breezy feel of someone casually telling us a story, a feeling I associate with, say, Heinlein at his best. . . In fact, the whole book is a great deal of fun . . . it's easily on a level with Le Guin's or Resnick's first novels."--"New York" Review of SF
"A highly impressive and thoroughly engrossing debut."

"How do you classify a seriously philosophical time-travel story of a young cyborg's first love amid religious conflict? As a good read."

"Baker''s characterizations are robust and detailed, as is her development of the historical setting ...Baker [is] a fantasist of considerable promise."

Praise for "In the Garden of Iden""Baker's characterizations are robust and detailed, as is her development of the historical setting ... [Readers] will recognize in Baker a fantasist of considerable promise."--"Publishers Weekly"
"So, how do you classify a seriously philosophical time-travel story of a young cyborg's first love amid religious conflict? As a good read."--"Locus"
"A highly impressive and thoroughly engrossing debut."--"Kirkus Reviews "on" In the Garden of Iden""The debut of a major talent. Kage Baker is a fresh, audacious, ambitious new voice." --Gardner Dozois on "In the Garden of Iden""""The prose is compulsively readable - it has the breezy feel of someone casually telling us a story, a feeling I associate with, say, Heinlein at his best. . . In fact, the whole book is a great deal of fun . . . it's easily on a level with Le Guin's or Resnick's first novels."--"New York"" Review of SF"
"The debut of a major talent. Kage Baker is a fresh, audacious, ambitious new voice."--Gardner Dozois

"Baker's characterizations are robust and detailed, as is her development of the historical setting ... [Readers] will recognize in Baker a fantasist of considerable promise."--"Publishers Weekly"
"So, how do you classify a seriously philosophical time-travel story of a young cyborg's first love amid religious conflict? As a good read."--"Locus"
"A highly impressive and thoroughly engrossing debut."--"Kirkus Reviews "on" In the Garden of Iden" "The debut of a major talent. Kage Baker is a fresh, audacious, ambitious new voice." --Gardner Dozois on "In the Garden of Iden""" "The prose is compulsively readable - it has the breezy feel of someone casually telling us a story, a feeling I associate with, say, Heinlein at his best. . . In fact, the whole book is a great deal of fun . . . it's easily on a level with Le Guin's or Resnick's first novels."--"New York"" Review of SF"

Baker's characterizations are robust and detailed, as is her development of the historical setting ... [Readers] will recognize in Baker a fantasist of considerable promise. "Publishers Weekly"

So, how do you classify a seriously philosophical time-travel story of a young cyborg's first love amid religious conflict? As a good read. "Locus"

A highly impressive and thoroughly engrossing debut. "Kirkus Reviews on In the Garden of Iden"

The debut of a major talent. Kage Baker is a fresh, audacious, ambitious new voice. "Gardner Dozois on In the Garden of Iden"

The prose is compulsively readable it has the breezy feel of someone casually telling us a story, a feeling I associate with, say, Heinlein at his best. . . In fact, the whole book is a great deal of fun . . . it's easily on a level with Le Guin's or Resnick's first novels. "New York Review of SF""

"Baker's characterizations are robust and detailed, as is her development of the historical setting ... [Readers] will recognize in Baker a fantasist of considerable promise." --Publishers Weekly

"So, how do you classify a seriously philosophical time-travel story of a young cyborg's first love amid religious conflict? As a good read." --Locus

"A highly impressive and thoroughly engrossing debut." --Kirkus Reviews on In the Garden of Iden

"The debut of a major talent. Kage Baker is a fresh, audacious, ambitious new voice." --Gardner Dozois on In the Garden of Iden

"The prose is compulsively readable - it has the breezy feel of someone casually telling us a story, a feeling I associate with, say, Heinlein at his best. . . In fact, the whole book is a great deal of fun . . . it's easily on a level with Le Guin's or Resnick's first novels." --New York Review of SF

About this edition

• Publisher: Tor Trade
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0765314576
• ISBN 13: 9780765314574
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 336